This blog is a place for me to muse about things that interest me: political, theological, personal. It is a place for the written word. The title "Jackie Speaks" is a reference to God's grace in helping me overcome a severe speech impediment.

Friday, May 15, 2015

George Washington Johns - A Survivor

A Line of Survivors

George Washington Johns (1841-1913) was my
Great-grandfather. He was born and died in Bachlott, Georgia. His only sojourn
of which I am aware was as a soldier in the Confederate Army.Family lore has it that he was wounded and
left behind by his compatriots. They leaned him against a large tree next to a
split-rail fence with expectations he would soon die.

As the story was passed down, he would state that he shot at a
lot of Yankees during the war but he only knew that he hit and killed two of
them. Both were killed as he leaned against that tree awaiting his own death.
They were apparently scouts on a mission. When they came to the fence a short
distance from where George rested. One jumped on top and over the fence and one
squeezed through the space beneath the top rail. He shot the jumper first and
the one caught in the fence second.

This must have happened near the end of the war when
Confederate soldiers were reduced to wearing tattered uniforms because George
confiscated some clothing from his dead counterparts. Later, when he reunited
with his Southern troops, one of them commented, “Johns, we left you behind for
dead and here you show up with a new pair of breeches and a new pair of boots.”
He responded, "I’d be wearing a new coat and a new hat too, but I figured you
fellas would have shot me.”

There are many ways to interpret this story. It is not the
portrait of a hero, but rather one of a survivor. The Johns on my branch of the
tree are known for their stubbornness; I prefer to call it steadfastness. We
are not quitters; we will stay the course and finish the hard tasks of life.
Others may take us for granted or abandon us for their own pleasures, but we
will remain true to our commitments. We will keep on fighting when others have
given up on us, or as I use to say in my youth “I am going to keep on keeping
on until I can’t and then I’m going to die and go to heaven.”